The Light Is Green

What's a brand worth?

The top ten global brands are worth over $400 billion in conjunction, according to Interbrand and their most recent yearly report.

These are the top ten brands with their estimated worth:

1. Coca-Cola, $63B
2. Microsoft, $58B
3. IBM, $57B
4. General Electric (GE), $51B
5. Nokia, $33B
6. Toyota, $32B
7. Intel, $31B
8. McDonald's, $29.4B
9. Disney, $29.2B
10. Mercedes Benz, $23B

Tags: Coca Cola, Microsoft, IBM, General Electric, GE, Nokia, Toyota, Intel, McDonald's, Disney, Mercedes Benz, Interbrand, branding, marketing, best brands

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Top brands in the world: #41-50

Interbrand ranks global brands every year... moving on down the chart, hare are brands #41 through 50 from their most recent yearly report for 2007:

41. Ford

42. Philips

43. Siemens

44. Nintendo

45. Harley-Davidson

46. Gucci

47. AIG

48. eBay

49. Axa

50. Accenture

Related posts:

• Top brands in the world: #1-10

• Top brands in the world: #11-20

• Top brands in the world: #21-30

• Top brands in the world: #31-40

Tags: branding, brands, marketing, top brands, Ford, Philips, Siemens, Nintendo, Harley-Davidson, Gucci, AIG, eBay, Axa, Accenture

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Top brands in the world: #31-40

Interbrand ranks global brands every year... these are brands #31 through 40 from their most recent yearly report for 2007:

31. Dell

32. JPMorgan

33. Apple

34. SAP

35. Goldman Sachs

36. Canon

37. Morgan Stanley

38. Ikea

39. UBS

40. Kellogg's

Related posts:

• Top brands in the world: #1-10

• Top brands in the world: #11-20

• Top brands in the world: #21-30

• Top brands in the world: #31-40

Tags: branding, brands, marketing, top brands, Interbrand, Dell, JPMorgan, Apple, SAP, Goldman Sachs, Canon, Morgan Stanley, Ikea, UBS, Kellogg's

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Top brands in the world: #21-30

Continuing with Interbrand's most recent yearly report on the most valuable brands in the world for 2007, here are the brands ranked 21 through 30:

21. Samsung

22. Merrill Lynch

23. HSBC

24. Nescafe

25. Sony

26. Pepsi

27. Oracle

28. UPS

29. Nike

30. Budweiser

Related posts:

• Top brands in the world: #1-10
• Top brands in the world: #11-20
• Top brands in the world: #21-30
• Top brands in the world: #31-40

Tags: branding, brands, marketing, top brands, Interbrand, Samsung, Merrill Lynch, HSBC, Nescafe, Sony, Pepsi, Oracle, UPS, Nike, Budweiser

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Top brands in the world: #11-20

According to Interbrand and their most recent yearly report on the most valuable brands in the world, these are brands eleven through twenty:

11. Citi

12. Hewlett-Packard

13. BMW

14. Marlboro

15. American Express

16. Gillette

17. Louis Vitton

18. Cisco

19. Honda

20. Google

Related posts:

• Top brands in the world: #1-10
• Top brands in the world: #11-20
• Top brands in the world: #21-30
• Top brands in the world: #31-40

Tags: branding, brands, marketing, top brands, Citi, Hewlett-Packard, BMW, Marlboro, American Express, Gilette, Louis Vitton, Cisco, Honda, Google, Interbrand

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Top ten brands in the world

These are the top ten global brands for 2007 according to Interbrand in their most recent yearly report:

1. Coca-Cola
2. Microsoft
3. IBM
4. General Electric (GE)
5. Nokia
6. Toyota
7. Intel
8. McDonald's
9. Disney
10. Mercedes Benz

What Interbrand does is measure brands as business assets. Their criteria for consideration are:

• There must be substantial publicly available financial data
• The brand must have at least one-third of revenues outside of its country-of-origin
• The brand must be a market-facing brand
• The Economic Value Added (EVA) must be positive
• The brand must not have a purely b2b single audience with no wider public profile and awareness

These criteria exclude brands such as Mars, which is privately held, or Wal-Mart, which is not sufficiently global (it does business in some international markets but not under the Wal-Mart brand).

The number one brand in the world, Coca-Cola, is valued at at $65 billion dollars.

Related posts:

• Top brands in the world: #1-10
• Top brands in the world: #11-20
• Top brands in the world: #21-30
• Top brands in the world: #31-40

Tags: Coca Cola, Microsoft, IBM, General Electric, GE, Nokia, Toyota, Intel, McDonald's, Disney, Mercedes Benz, Interbrand, branding, marketing, best brands

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VW + Apple = iCar?

Are Apple and Volkswagen working together to create the iCar?

(Actually the name is just rumored as is all talk currently going on about this).

All that is really known is that a "Volkswagen spokesperson told German magazine Capital that an iCar may be on the way. Steve Jobs and VW Chairman Martin Winterkorn got together in California a few days ago to plan an intensive co-operation with the building of vehicles."

Rumors and more rumors say the iCar will sport Apple's AirPort networking system plus a touch-screen iMac.

Tags: Apple, VW, iCar, Steje Jobs, Martin Winterkorn, Volkswagen, automotive, auto industry, automotive industry

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Apple lesson in customer care

I am a recent Mac convert, at least at home, and a big fan of the company and their products.

Recently, Apple made many loyal customers unhappy when they cut the price of their cool new iPhone by $200, from $599 to $399.

This is actually a widely known and accepted practice in technology: as soon as a high-demand tech item goes on sale, there is a price premium to be paid. Early adopters know this and buy willingly. Some time later, prices drop.

The thing is, the iPhone's price drop was pretty steep, and happened only a few weeks after the product was launched.

Users were not happy and wrote to Apple in droves. The flip side: Apple's success is based on happy, or rather passionate, customers.

What did Steve Jobs do?

He wrote an open letter to original iPhone customers explaining why Apple did what they did, the long-term effects they are looking for, and apologizing for not taking care of early iPhone customers as well as they could have. And he also gave all early iPhone buyers a $100 credit.

In other words:

1. Acknowledge the mistake.  Even if, as in this case, it wasn't really an error, just an unfortunate situation).
2. Apologize immediately. Explain what happened.
3. If possible, make it up to the customer. I feel this is icing on the cake, as customers will be pleasantly surprised with steps one and two. But if you can also give them something extra, go for it.

If Apple can do this for hundreds of thousands of its customers, it should be pretty easy for small and medium businesses to adopt such a proactive attitude when something goes wrong with their clients. In fact, very easy, as most screw-ups happen just one customer at a time.

Tags: customer satisfaction, branding, Apple, iPhone, Steve Jobs, best practices

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Brand yourself as repulsive

Listerine made a great marketing move with its mouthwash many years ago. The tagline went something like this: It's so foul tasting that you can be sure it's killing all those germs.

But this is much different, and I guess falls into what we could call "anti-branding"?

Starting next year, British law mandates that all cigarette packs and other tobacco products must feature graphic photographs showing the detrimental effects of smoking.

The idea is to shock more people into quitting.

What photos will be used?

In another canny move to increase awareness, the British Department of Health is letting the public decide through an online campaign. Visitors to the DH's website voted for the 15 most disturbing photos out of a possible 42.

(You can see them here, I stopped after the first one, shown above.)

British Health Secretary Alan Johnson says the pictures are necessary because smokers have grown numb to current written warnings on packages.

   

"We've had the messages on cigarette packets since 2003, warning that smoking kills, for instance, but the evidence is that's very effective, but it's diminishing in its effect.

   

"Using graphic images to get the same message across -- that smoking kills, that people who smoke will die younger".

To give credit where credit is due, the precursors in this are Belgium, Canada, India, Australia and Singapore.

Tags: smoking, health, cigarettes, tobacco

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Chinese go brand building

We've been talking about how the number one hurdle facing China's automakers in their bid to penetrate mature markets like North America and Europe is the lack of recognizable brands.

(Unfortunately, that has been compounded by the recent quality fiasco suffered by Brilliance Auto).

Now, China's three largest car manufacturers have announced plans to invest a combined $5 billion dollars in a branding and intellectual property rights effort.

They are Shanghai Automotive, First Automobile Works (FAW) and Dongfeng Motor. Together, these three companies own 50 percent of the Chinese domestic market.

First Automobile Works (FAW)

FAW will spend $1.7 billion to develop its proprietary brands. The money will go to product design, new hardware and software, and incorporating primary auto technologies.

By 2015, First Auto wants to have:

• Four sedan platforms
• Fifty different models covering all market segments
• An annual capacity of one million cars

FAW recently completed designs on their first independently developed sedan engine; it now goes into mass production.

FAW also has plans to list in the stock market.

Shanghai Automotive

Shanghai Automotive will spend some $3.5 billion dollars over the next five years, most of which will go towards designing new engines, designing own-brand sedans, and for building a technical center.

These are the next steps Shanghai Auto has announced:

Step 1: Invest $500 million to develop economy, medium range, and high end cars based on the Rover technology they bought in 2004. Boost output to 120,000 sedans and 170,000 engines.

Step 2: Invest $500 million to expand production capacity of independently-developed sedans, to reach 150,000 cars and 150,000 engines.

Step 3: Invest $130 million to upgrade their SsangYong SUV initiative and reach an annual capacity of 24,000 vehicles.

Shanghai has also agreed with smaller rival Nanjing Automobile to cooperate on their Roewe and MG projects.

Dongfeng Motor

Dongfeng has invested $1.3 billion dollars in their independently developed car program.

They have just begun construction of a new plant, which will reach an annual capacity of 330,000 sedans.

Dongfeng will also spend $80 million to build an independent R & D facility. Their first independently developed sedan model will come out at the end of 2008, branded as the Shuangyan. It will imitate the Elysee, manufactured by Dongfeng Peugeot Citroen.

So reports China Daily.

Tags: FAW, First Automotive Works, Dongfeng Motor, Dongfeng, Shanghai Automotive, Shanghai Automotive Industrial Corp, SAIC, SAIC Motor, Roewe, Roewe 750, Rover, automotive, auto industry, automotive industry, China, Chinese auto industry, Chinese automotive industry

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